Beautifully intimate offering from hugely talented Canadian duo rewards the attentive listener.
Mama’s Broke, Canadian duo Amy Lou Keeler and Lisa Maria, have spent many a year on the road. Their 2017 debut album Count The Wicked earned the duo a Canadian Folk Music award and 2022’s Juno nominated Narrow Line consolidated their position as a force to be reckoned with in that rich Canadian pool of artistic talent. That success has been built on putting in the hard yards on the road, writing when they could, barely able to draw breath. For their latest album Reunion, the pair deliberately wanted to set time aside to write and record in a less demanding environment, fostering an air of calm and stillness that had eluded them almost from the start.
That stillness is reflected in an album of quiet intimacy that brilliantly showcases all that the duo bring to the table – gorgeous vocal harmonies sitting alongside sublime instrumentation. The writing reflects a world coming apart in plain sight and of fractured communities. It is not an uncommon theme these days, but these are songs that are not designed to preach, rather to question and reflect.
There is a lovely intimacy at play throughout the album, with vocal stylings very reminiscent of Sarah Jarosz at times. Build It Up is a fine example, not only of those vocals, but also as an indicator of the fact that this is a talent based equally on the music with Keeler’s banjo a perfect partner for the fiddle of Maria. The song laments the loss of those things that mean so much to us as individuals and as a community. “Driving down Melrose Lane, no cattle call across the plain, now a highway, once a road, and the green wood hauled away.” It acts as a warning passed down through generations about fighting to protect what is precious “If you don’t build it up, then somebody else will tear it down.”
At times the album has an old-time country feel to it, at others there is a distinct nod to bluegrass. The thread that forms the beating heart of the album though are those vocals. Playing for hours on the streets needed a repertoire that could hold attention and sustain emotion and that schooling is perhaps best illustrated by the haunting The Nameless. The storytelling here is rooted firmly in folk, the nameless being all those women whose voices are never heard, the quiet erasure of their identity through history. Each verse has its own short story and has its own summation “Just one forsaken lover / Just one more nameless number / Just one more missing daughter. One more, one more, How many till no more.”
Reunion should be viewed as an indulgence. A thing of beauty, it will reward the thoughtful and contemplative and those who set aside a wedge of their own time to savour offerings such as this. The manner in which the album was recorded merits the same attention from the listener.
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